The cost of delivering wheat to Egypt reached a record $301/tonne (15,000 Egyptian pounds) on August 26, as Russian shipments collapsed and a queue of up to 70 vessels formed along Ukraine’s alternative Danube route.
The new benchmark was $16 (800 pounds), or 5.6%, above the $285 delivered cost recorded on August 20 and $55–57, or 22–23%, above the price covered by The Cairo Report last week.
Egyptian buyers were bidding $300/tonne, while sellers wanted $305–306. Most trades that could realistically be executed were being offered through Russia’s Baltic ports, with freight in the low to mid-$40s, rather than through the cheaper but impaired Black Sea route.
Russian wheat itself remained priced at $215/tonne before freight. The resulting $86 gap between the crop’s nominal export value and its delivered Egyptian price measures what buyers must now pay to secure a cargo that can be loaded, insured, and moved.
The previous increase came from a sudden rise in freight, but the latest one reflects a wider problem. A cheap offer at an unavailable terminal is no longer setting the Egyptian market, and wheat that can complete the voyage is.
“For now, we’re just waiting and not buying,” one Egyptian buyer said.
The record price does not immediately threaten the state’s subsidized bread program, however, because its effects are reaching the private wheat market first.
Market participants estimated that privately held wheat stocks covered only one month, or approximately 500,000 tonnes, while state stocks covered about six months following the domestic purchase of 4.72 million tonnes from Egyptian farmers. The government has therefore refrained from buying wheat internationally since the start of the current marketing year in July.
Documents obtained last week by Al Manassa show how that protection was built up. Egypt imported 8.18 million tonnes in the first eight months of 2026, up 1.41 million tonnes, or 21%, from 6.77 million during the same period last year.
But the increase was concentrated before the present disruption. Wheat arrivals in July and August fell to 480,000 tonnes, down 1.47 million tonnes, or 75.4%, from 1.95 million a year earlier, receiving much less once traditional routes were disrupted.
Egyptian importers of Russian wheat faced an estimated replacement loss of 1,100 pounds on each tonne bought at the latest international price.
The broader import price reached 16,250 pounds per tonne, up 2,000 pounds, or 14%, from 14,250 pounds in July. Flour prices rose by the same nominal amount to between 18,000 and 25,000 pounds, depending on quality, according to Al Manassa.
The national reserve and the commercial supply chain are therefore moving on different timetables, as the state continues drawing from wheat procured before the shipping crisis, while private importers must replace what mills use at today’s price.
The Russian side of the disruption has become easier to measure since last week.
Russia shipped just 62,000 tonnes of wheat to Egypt between August 11 and 20, almost eight times less than during the same period last year, and Cairo fell to fourth place among buyers during those 10 days, behind Bangladesh, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia.
The contraction was broader than the Egyptian route. Russian wheat reached eight countries during the period, compared with 28 a year earlier, and just seven exporters shipped wheat, down from 36, while grain moved through eight ports instead of 29.
The collapse occurred as Russian wheat became cheaper due to a surplus in the country’s domestic markets. Prices at the Port of Novorossiysk fell $4 to $220/tonne, while French wheat rose $3 to $265, and US wheat increased $11 to $281.
Prices paid to Russian producers fell 20% from the beginning of the season.
The wheat was accumulating behind the ports, pushing down what farmers and inland traders could receive, as the price to get the wheat to Egypt moved in the opposite direction.
Restoring the previous route will also take longer than the Russian government initially indicated. The Novorossiysk Grain Processing Plant, or NKHP, estimated that restoring its export loading capacity could take between one and four months.
An August 12 attack on the Russian port damaged specialized structures and equipment used to load customers’ grain.
NKHP, the Novorossiysk Grain Terminal and KSK previously handled about one-third of Russia’s grain exports, and a four-month repair period would extend the disruption beyond the peak post-harvest shipping window and through the end of 2026.
The disruption has also affected inland contracts, as Russia’s National Commodity Exchange extended two wheat deals until October 5 after a seller documented its inability to dispatch the grain by rail, citing restrictions on cargo deliveries to Novorossiysk and damage to port infrastructure.
The Russian government then approved more than 9.5 billion rubles for subsidized rail transport of agricultural products. State grain company OZK said the funding would help redirect cargo through other ports and land crossings amid the “closure of key export routes.”
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s alternative route has not closed, but it has become crowded, slow, and expensive.
Between 50 and 70 vessels were waiting near Romania’s Sulina Canal on August 25 for access to Ukrainian Danube ports. Only two or three ships could pass towards those ports each day, while delays cost owners as much as $8,000 per vessel per day, Reuters reported.
Ukraine exported 539,000 tonnes of grain between August 1 and 21, down 1.19 million tonnes, or 68.8%, from 1.73 million a year earlier, while rail deliveries to the Danube increased elevenfold from July as traders diverted cargo from the Greater Odesa ports.
The additional trains carried more grain to a maritime exit that could not process ships at the same rate, and each day spent waiting was then added to the eventual freight charge, whether the cargo was sold to Egypt or another buyer.
Ukraine and Romania, attempting to ease the costly delays, agreed on August 28 to establish a “joint coordination center” for vessel traffic, increase Romanian customs and border teams, and continue work on night navigation through Sulina.
Still, the route remains exposed to attacks. On August 29, a Russian strike on the Izmail district in Odesa killed one person, injured three, destroyed five grain trucks, and damaged three more.
Two days earlier, the Progress IV vessel caught fire and sank about 15 nautical miles from Romania’s Sfântu Gheorghe branch of the Danube.
The vessel was sailing towards Turkey, and Romanian President Nicușor Dan said it “appeared to have been struck” but cautioned against attributing the incident before an investigation established the cause.
Its sinking nevertheless moved the security question beyond vessels entering a Russian or Ukrainian port, as the ship went down in Romania’s exclusive economic zone, along the approach used by vessels serving the Danube alternative.
Al Manassa had reported that Egyptian buyers were resorting to French shipments to replace delayed or canceled Russian and Ukrainian cargoes.
Of the two cited shipments, the Nana Leen, at the time of publishing, had reached La Pallice on France’s Atlantic coast and was still at anchor, while the second vessel, the Genoa, was still sailing towards the port and is expected to arrive on the afternoon of August 31.
Each ship was scheduled to load approximately 30,000 tonnes of French wheat for Egypt.
However, the two vessels are Handysize bulk carriers, and Egypt’s French wheat imports are often shipped aboard larger Panamax vessels, typically carrying around 60,000 tonnes or more.
The Nana Leen, built in 1995, can carry 28,754 tonnes, while the 2005-built Genoa has a capacity of 33,745 tonnes and recently called at Damietta in June.
If both cargoes load and arrive, their combined 60,000 tonnes would cover about 12% of the private sector’s estimated monthly wheat requirement, equivalent to roughly 3.6 days of consumption.
As for the clearest commodity data available at Damietta, the port held 30,379 tonnes of wheat on August 30, including 8,021 tonnes in its public-sector silo and 22,358 tonnes in private warehouses.
The balance was down 15,685 tonnes, or 34.1%, from 46,064 tonnes on August 24, falling by 37,841 tonnes, or 55.5%, from 68,220 tonnes on August 20, and by 107,654 tonnes, or 78%, from 138,033 tonnes on July 31.
Most of the latest decrease occurred in the public silo, whose balance fell 62.5% between August 24 and 30, while the privately owned wheat balance declined 9.5%.
At the same time, the shutdown has spread from grain terminals to the container trade connecting Egypt with Russia.
On August 27, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) stopped accepting new bookings to and from Novorossiysk after the MSC Ulsan III was struck while approaching the Russian port.
MSC’s Black Sea String B normally begins in Alexandria and ends in Novorossiysk. It carried 25,352 containers during the past three months, with an average voyage of eight days, but its service profile now lists no deployed vessel.
The direct trade carries Egyptian goods north and Russian goods south mainly through FESCO’s Alexandria–Novorossiysk service, which transports Egyptian fruit and refrigerated produce to Russia, and returns with containerized lumber, fertilizer and pulses.
The government currently holds enough wheat to postpone buying at the record high price, but private mills do not. They encounter the record price as their existing stocks reach the end of their one-month coverage.
Russian producers face the reverse problem as their crop loses value because exporters cannot reach enough ships or terminals.
But as the government continues considering a transition from subsidized bread and food entitlements to a fixed cash value, households will be exposed to changes in wheat and freight prices.
The new record provides a subsequent test of that argument.
Wheat delivered to Egypt became another 5.6% more expensive in six days, and so far, no cash subsidy proposal by the government contains a mechanism requiring the fixed payments to rise with it when the switch eventually happens.
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